


Bone Deep

by Vaguely_downwards



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Chronic Illness, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Sickfic, Sorta I guess, Very Brief Mention of Suicidal Ideation, love fixes nothing but the ache of loneliness, lycanthropy, people trying their best for other people, rather a lot of it to be quite honest, sick
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-18
Updated: 2020-11-18
Packaged: 2021-03-09 22:34:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,815
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27623444
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vaguely_downwards/pseuds/Vaguely_downwards
Summary: The day of the full moon Remus gets incredibly sick. Tonks attempts to help."“I know you don't need me to tell you that that sucks arse Remus…. But it sucks arse.”He snorted an exhale of a laugh as he made a rough murmur of agreement at the back of his throat."
Relationships: Remus Lupin/Nymphadora Tonks
Comments: 3
Kudos: 30





	Bone Deep

Remus Lupin woke up. 

Then he vomited. 

Bile splattered the floor below the rusted frame of the bed, creeping into the gaps between the floorboards. 

Another heave, His whole body curling in on itself as the burning rose in his throat. Being sick he had always found, though never pleasant, wasn’t truly the problem... it was the smell. His stomach churned once more. He found himself wishing he had eaten more at dinner the previous night, force fed himself just to give him something to inevitably bring back up again. Anything to stop his stomach contracting on nothing but air. Teeth gritted against another violent wave of nausea, he raised a shaking hand for his wand that lay, as it always did, on the bedside table. His fumbling fingers refused to find what little grip he would need to lift it. They nudged it once, twice, three times and Remus watched, blurry eyed and resigned, as it rolled off the bedside table and along the floor. Well and truly out of his reach. He contemplated getting it, even began to try, but the scream of his muscles as he moved had him retreating back to the fetal position. 

He was shivering now, biting his own lip to stop the incessant chattering of his teeth, holding his arms to his chest to allay the tremors. All the while a thin layer of sweat seemed to fall upon him. He could feel it trickling slowly down each exposed bump of his spine, down the inside of his arms, too thin, always too thin, and across his top lip. He could taste its saltiness upon his tongue as his teeth clanged together like funeral bells. 

He hated this. It’d been this way as long as he could remember, ever since razor sharp teeth had pierced delicate skin. Ever since the child had become the monster. It never got easier. They say time heals all wounds but how can it when those wounds were ripped open month after month. Wounds on top of wounds on top of wounds. Ever growing, ever deepening. The physical pain ebbed and flowed through his veins, but the emotional and mental toll of lycanthropy was ever present. No matter the pain killers or the friends or the drugs, of which there had been many at one point, it never loosened its grip. 

He was tired. A bone deep exhaustion that weighed down his soul like a cinder block. The lack of sleep that came hand in hand with the position of a front line soldier only exacerbated the dark circles under his eyes and the weariness in his gait. No matter how long he slept he never felt well rested, never escaped the cloud of fatigue that seemed to buzz around him. And he was tired of being tired. It wasn't an incessant exhaustion of it as he had once felt, a pain that had driven him to the edge of rooftops and the rails of bridges. He didn't, he was finding now, have the energy to sustain the desire for an end anymore. Instead he went through the motions of his life day in and day out. He smiled when he was expected to and spoke when he thought he should and otherwise seemed to cease to exist at all. He felt less of a man these days and more.. Incorporeal, a mess. A jumble of experiences and trauma in threadbare jumpers and holey socks. It was better this way. And so so much _worse._

He heaved again, splattering the floor once more. He didn't know what the time was - he never did just before the moon...or just after, and right now he couldn't remember which it was. He hadn’t transformed last night, or he was pretty sure he hadn't at least and Sirius had promised to stay with him again. So, it was the morning before the full moon. So, the worst was yet to come. He tried to swallow his groan but the lump in his throat refused to let it pass. It seemed to echo around the room. 

A knock on the door. Soft and hesitant. Remus ignored it. It came again. 

“Remus?” The door creaked slowly open 

He lifted his head to see if it really was _her_ standing in his doorway as he shook and shivered on the bed. If, after months of dancing around the subject and mere weeks of what was beginning to seem like the best thing that had happened to Remus in years if not ever, she was watching him completely fall apart. 

Big mistake. 

The room gave an all mighty lurch, as though someone had powered up the waltzers with him on board. He could only groan at her once more. 

“Oh shit Remus” Tonks closed the door softly behind her as she tiptoed towards him. “I thought I could hear...well that”. She gestured to the mess he had left on the floor casually, her eyes darting between it and him and his wand. 

“I’m sorry” he croaked out. Even to his own ringing ears, it was a pitiful sound. 

“Nah, that’s not what I meant…” she trailed off, as though trying to work out what she had meant. She shrugged. “Just worried, that’s all” 

She smiled at him then. As though there wasn't a puddle of his sick between them, as if he wasn't curled, topless and sweaty and shivering before her. It made butterflies he was sure he shouldn't have the energy for erupt in his stomach, and with them came another heave. 

“Here.” Tonks said. She waved her wand and some of the bile disappeared. Most, however, remained steadfastly where it was. “I don't know why I thought that would work really” 

He said nothing in return, perhaps couldn't, but continued to battle with his body, fighting to keep his eyelids open. 

“Do you want your wand?” She asked softly. He nodded slowly, carefully, realising too late that it may have fallen in the...splash zone. If it had, Tonks didn't seem to care. She reached down to pick it up, wiping it surreptitiously on her pyjama bottoms before handing it over to him. 

“Moon thing?” she asked, as he took his wand with a shaking hand. He nodded. 

“Right…. Potions do anything?”. 

He shrugged, or as close to a shrug as he could manage. 

“Okay, I’ll be right back” and she turned on her heel. He opened his mouth to apologise, tell her she needn't bother and he was fine on his own here, but by the time he had remembered how to speak she was gone. 

He had just cleaned the mess off of the floorboards when he heard another gentle knock on the door. He pointed his wand at it and it swung open to reveal her, clutching vials to her chest. 

“Didn’t drop them on the stairs!” She exclaimed brightly, flashing him a grin. He felt his lips twitching back at her. “Now I don't know what, if anything, will help. But I figured anything was better than the idea of you sitting up here alone looking like you’d missed your appointment with the reaper.” 

She crossed the room and deposited her bounty on his bed, before dashing back and grabbing the bin. 

“Just in case” she said, placing it by his bedside. “ Right, let healer Tonks take a look at you, before I fuck off and let you sleep” 

And he did, nodding or shaking his head to her questions as she poured potions into a shot glass, gulping them down when she told him too. He waited for the pity to cloud her eyes, if not the fear, waited for her to look at him like a poor lost and hopeless child. But as they sat there, her on the edge of the bed, him propped up against his pillows, it was like nothing out of the ordinary was happening. He couldn't quite believe his luck. 

“I’m sorry if I woke you” He said finally as the potions began to kick in. His voice was croaky but no longer shook. “ I didn't know you were here” 

“You didn't, don't worry” she flashed him another trademark grin as she stoppered a luminous yellow potion with the slogan ‘Mr Hinston’s Xtreme Nausea Relief’ on the bottle. “I just got back from that stake out with Kingsley. Told him I’d do the report and leave it here for Dumbledore. And I was knackered so I thought I’d just sleep in one of the spare bedrooms, maybe see you in the afternoon. Just got changed when I heard you. I thought it might be Sirius blacked out again y’know, thought someone should save him from himself” 

“I’m still very sorry” 

“No need to be. Hardly looked like you were having the time of your life up here love” 

He chuckled softly, relaxing further into his pillows. His eyelids felt wondrously heavy, but the bone deep ache hadn’t subsided. 

“Every month like this?” She asked, and he could just about spot the forced casualness of the question as she tried not to let any pity seep into her voice. Silently, he thanked her for it. They hadn’t spoken about it, not really. Obviously she knew, and understood that sometimes he was sick, sometimes he was a fully transformed snarling beast, but she’d never pushed him for more information and he...well he hadn't wanted to offer it. He was, as Sirius liked to point out, a cagey bastard. 

“No, Some are better…” He trailed off, it wasn't a lie after all. 

“But some are worse?” He shrugged, trying to seem as nonchalant as possible. He hoped it’d worked. 

“Budge over” she said, pulling at his duvet and clambering in beside him. Obviously not nonchalant enough. 

“ I know you don't need me to tell you that that sucks arse Remus…. But it sucks arse.”

He snorted an exhale of a laugh as he made a rough murmur of agreement at the back of his throat. The nausea may have receded, but the itch in his bones was still building, his body still shaking against his will. 

“You haven't got to do this alone y’know Remus” Her voice was soft, but her eyes blazed with determination, and something else he couldn't quite place. “Let me help, yeah?” and she wrapped an arm around his shoulder gently, oh so gently, and held him to her, his back to her chest, as he shook. 

In a hushed voice, barely above a whisper, she began to talk to him. Most of it was pure nonsense: details about her evening with Kingsley, wondering when Mundungus had last taken a bath, if they really would take away Dumbledore’s chocolate frog card. He let it wash over him as his eyelids gave in to the pull of gravity and the pain gave way to sleep. 


End file.
